CORNWALLIS, N.S. — Conservative supporters are celebrating a return to the House of Commons for the party in the West Nova riding with the election of Chris d’Entremont on Oct. 21.
D’Entremont led the vote throughout the evening as all poll results kept coming in. At times the gap between he and Liberal candidate Jason Deveau were a few hundred votes and at other times the gap had widened to 1,000 votes or more.
West Nova was the only riding in Nova Scotia not to go Liberal in this 2019 vote – the 10 other ridings in the province all went red.
With 229 of 229 polls reporting, d’Entremont finished the night with 18,390 votes to Jason Deveau’s 17,034 votes – which was a much closer race between these two parties compared to the last federal election when 16,859 votes separated the two parties. This was, in part, a result of other parties in the race having a much stronger showing in this election than four years ago.
Green Party candidate Judy N. Green polled very well, in comparison to the party's results in the 2015 election. The Green Party finished the West Nova vote with 5,949 votes compared to 1,904 votes for the party in the last election. The NDP also saw a gain with 5,020 votes for candidate Matthew Dubois after all polls had reported, compared to the NDP's overall 3,084 votes in the last federal vote.
Entering the federal political scene was a risk that paid off for d’Entremont, who has seen a lot of success at the ballot box at the provincial level. During the past five consecutive provincial elections d’Entremont has won the Argyle and/or the Argyle-Barrington seat. When he announced he was running federal, d’Entremont said it was something he had been mulling over for some time. He said he wanted to work on behalf of a larger segment of constituents by representing the federal riding.
There were five candidates running for the West Nova seat.
The unofficial results on election night with all 229 polls reporting were:
Percentage wise here is how the voting results broke down: Conservative Chris d'Entremont 39.26%; Liberal Jason Deveau 36.36%; Green Judy N. Green 12.7%; NDP Matthew Dupois 10.72%; Veterans Coalition Gloria Jane Cook 0.97%.
In an interview at the Annapolis Basin Conference Centre, where d’Entremont and supporters watched the night’s results, d’Entremont had this to say after his Conservative win and what message voters had sent when they marked their ballots.
“I think they’re saying they’re tired of being ignored," d'Entremont said of constituents in West Nova. "There was a lot of issues at the doorstep. The challenge is going to be to work with different levels of government to get some of these things accomplished.
“The issue of health care is not one that the federal government can solve all on its own, so we need to work with the province to make sure those things get done,” he said. “There’s a number of infrastructure issues we need to deal with that are municipal based, so I think we need to pull everybody together and get working really quickly on these things.”
Asked if his experience in provincial politics stands him in good stead now, d’Entremont said, "I think it does. I think knowing both sides of that game is good. You sort of know how the provincial system works so you can work with them. It’s going to take a little bit of learning to understand the federal system, but I think it will be good to put somebody in the middle that has an idea of both of those realities.”
D’Entremont said he felt they had a really strong campaign team. While he said they could have used more volunteers, he still thought the campaign was well managed. There were several youth at the conference centre on election night. D’Entremont added he thinks that says there is a place for youth in the Conservative party.
“We’re not an old party. I think there’s lots of vitality here,” he said. “We need to work to make sure we have more of them as we roll onto the next election.”
He will be representing the riding in a Liberal minority government.
The West Nova riding does go back and forth between the two parties, albeit sometimes it takes more than one election for the party to regain the seat. Liberal Colin Fraser held the seat the last four years, but in the two elections prior to that the seat was held by the Conservatives, with voters twice electing Greg Kerr.
THE NIGHT FOR LIBERALS
At the Clare Golf and Country Club the Liberals had gathered to watch the results. The evening there with a quiet one as supporters held out optimism that as more polls reported the vote would turn more in their candidate’s favour, but it never did.
Jason Deveau arrived at the golf club around 11 p.m., where supporters applauded him and thanked him for running. Speaking to supporters Deveau told them it had been an exciting time, knocking on thousands of doors and driving thousands of kilometres, crisscrossing the riding.
“And even wearing out a pair of running shoes walking up and down our streets,” he laughed.
“While tonight is a hard night, I have no regrets. We fought the good fight. I gave it my all but it was not enough for us to win.”
Deveau thanked his supporters and campaign volunteers for their unwavering commitment to the campaign, and thanked his wife Jessica for her support. He also extended congratulations to all candidates in the West Nova race.
“Democracy is nothing without choice, and I would like to acknowledge the other candidates for standing up for their own beliefs and offering the people of West Nova a full range of political options from which to choose,” Deveau said.
He then extended congratulations to d’Entremont on his election win.
“I … congratulate Chris d’Entremont on his successful campaign and wish him the very best as he begins a new chapter in his political life.”
MORE ABOUT CHRIS D’ENTREMONT
D’Entremont won the Conservative nomination in a three-person race. On July 31 he resigned his provincial seat to run federally.
First elected to the Nova Scotia Legislature in 2003, his constituents had re-elected him four more times in the next four consecutive elections. Provincially he has served the province as Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Aquaculture, Acadian Affairs, Health and Community Services. For the past six years has been the House Leader of the Official Opposition.
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